Corsican Language

Introduction

The Corsican language current is a whole of Dialecte S Romance (i.e. resulting from the Latin , like Italian or French), subdivided in two principal dialectal groups, the cismontincu (name traditional: cismontano ), very " proche" Tuscan, and the pumuntincu (traditional name: oltramontano ), which shows common characteristics with the speeches of the Southern Italy, but also with the Sarde and especially the sicilian Dialecte. This whole of Corsican dialects presents a real unit, in the sense that rules on the level of the writing allow, for example, to pass from the one to the other (language-roof). This coexistence of the unit and the variety gave rise to the concept Sociolinguistique of polynomic Langue.

The Corsican language is spoken in Corsica but also in north about the Sardinia (with regard to its alternative pumuntincu , with the dialects which are the Gallurais and the sassarais). Its statute of Langue itself is relatively recent: it dates from the Sixties of the 20th century), and is disputed by many linguists, who see there a political claim without base from the linguistic point of view. Within the meaning of the classification established by UNESCO, Corsican belongs to the languages threatened of disappearance before the end of the century.

For certain linguists, it does not return in the generally allowed definition of Romance Langue distinct , being given its strong proximity with the Italian (especially the Toscan, dialects around Rome and those of Ombrie) and its other alternatives.

  • Also, the name of language , adopted in this article, it is regarded as unsuitable for certain linguists specialists in the Romance languages whereas she is unanimously recognized, for example, for the Sardinian Langue.
  • On the other hand, other linguists regard Corsican as a language with whole share, taking into account the unit consituée by the whole of the insular dialects. They also put forward that the fact of not recognizing with a language such a statute is often used to minimize the impact of the possible extinction of a language. In fact, Corsican is recognized like a language by the international standard ISO 639.
The two positions can be regarded as reconcilable: first is held from a typological point of view (structural), whereas the second is from the point of view of the representations and the development. In Sociolinguistique, the typology of Heinz Kloss solved the problem of the definition of a language : Corsican is a Langue by development or Langue Ausbau (separate development of Italian); but Corsican and Italian, by the affinity of their structures, form a Diasystème together (or Langue by distance or Langue Abstand).

Geographical distribution of the dialects

Within the Romance Languages, Corsican belongs to the linguistic group Italo-novel. The Corsican language is employed in the whole of the island (without its employment being generalized there), except for the towns of Bonifacio and Calvi where one still speaks a dialect Ligure about origin génoise. Because of old and strong emigration of Corsicans on the island of Maddalena, in the north of the Sardinia, one speaks there same Corsican as in Sartène. The Gallurais or Gallurien ( gallurese or gadduresu ), dialect of the area of the Gallura, in the north of the Sardinia, is also very close to the speeches of the south of Corsica (those are besides closer between them than with the other alternatives to Corsican, cf R.A. Hall, Jr.), like also those spoken around Sassari (the sassarese , Sassarien) - whereas the Sarde itself must be regarded as a definitely distinct language (it is very different from the Italian and its various dialects). For example, all these Corsican dialects and not-Sardinians of Sardinia have a plural in - I as in Italian, whereas typical Sardinian plural is in - S (as in French or Spanish). Nevertheless, a Substrate probably common to the both languages Sardinian and Corsican and the membership of a Romania africana gives many features common to both languages, reinforced by the old one and important occupation pisane and aragon common ease. The Its cacuminal, divided by the dialect of Sartène and majority of the Sardinian dialects, or the interjection (very frequent)! , commune in the two islands, are traces even older (former, undoubtedly, with the occupation Phénicie of the two islands).

The principal alternatives of Corsican are the Sartenais, which includes the sassarais and the Gallurais of Sardinia, taravais it, Corsican of the area of Vico-Ajaccio, septentrional Corsican (Corsica Cape and Bastia) and the dialect of Venaco. Traditionally, all these dialects are divided into two groups: the Cismontano and the Oltramontano. The resemblance of the lexicon varies between 79 and 89%. The dialect génois of Bonifacio is closest to that of Bastia with 78% of lexical resemblance.

Language and culture

Until the beginning of the 19th century, with the key date of 1852 where only French becomes official and where Italian is proscribed, Corsican and Italian are regarded as two forms of the same language (a Diasystème), Corsican being the spoken form, with its local alternatives, Italian the written language. Starting from the Second Empire, Corsican is crossed of Italian who is not any more the administrative language of the island and tends to being perceived - in particular through the slow development of a literature of Corsican expression - as an autonomous language. Currently two currents of thought are opposed at the academics. Those which think that the Corsican language is resulting from Tuscan then from of is detached a little to evolve/move until our days (with old traces, former to Romania, like the Its cacuminal), and those, which think that it evolved/moved separately rather early (since bottom Latin) until our time by being subject to throughout its history the linguistic influences of the various “conquerors”, of which in particular Tuscan, or today French. This last assumption is defended only in publications of nationalist type , the statute Tuscan of Corsican, with whom it shares a lexical resemblance of about 90%, being called into question by any novelist, in spite of his characteristics and its alternatives.

The Corsican cultural movement did not really seek to impose a language unified on the whole of the island. The Corsican Linguiste S speak about “polynomic language”; its Enseignement is initially founded on each local variety then on the passive knowledge of the whole of the speeches of the island. One has assisted however, for a few years, at the intellectuals, the creators, the communication specialists, with the emergence of “worked out Corsican”, relatively unified. This language present on a territory where the demographic pressure is low, where the will to speak French (phenomenon which one finds frequently elsewhere) for “being better integrated” has creates a linguistic break between the generations of second half of the 20th century, where the omnipresence of a language other than also strong and massive Corsican forever be only today (media, schooling…), where an increased mixing of the populations makes that the parents being able to transmit their native tongue are done today increasingly rare, where finally the French state takes into account only partially reality of the languages known as minority, makes that the question of its survival is clearly put. The nationalist movement recent obtained to him a statute of Langue , taught in an optional way as of the elementary school.

Owing to the fact that Corsican written forever under the occupation pisane or génoise, it is remarkable that the official toponyms of Corsica for the majority are written in Italian and not in Corsican. At XVe and 16th centuries, some French cartographers went so far as to translate them, but only remain theRusset-red one and Saint-Florent (in italic the Italian or French historical names out of use appear today).

It is a regional language of France, in the official list published by the government French (ministry for Culture/DGLF). It is used in the road signs in Corsica. However, it is not an official language in France, only French having this statute there. As well as the other French regional languages, the Corsican language is currently threatened of disappearance, within the meaning of the classification established by UNESCO.

Examples

Dialectology

( to write in a more correct way )

For example, in Pumonte one uses the His cacuminal ( quiddu against quellu - that, that one, this - cismonte). Another similarity with the the Mezzogiorno, the sound/è/into final of a word does not exist with the Pumonte: U pastoru or has nazioni against “ U pastore ” or has nazione with the Cismonte. One can finally note that where the center and the north of the island employs /o/ or the/è/, sartenais it maintains /u/ or /i/: U curri against U corre with the cismonte.

The pumontincu comprises many southernmost features but remains substantially a dialect Tuscan.

See too

Internal bonds

External bond

  • Dictionary and Corsican language class
  • Corsican Language class on Corsican Wikibooks
  • Language class/Corsu di lingua corsa
  • has lingua corsa adatta with E nove tecnulugie
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